Books More Short Trips (1999) and this time The Doctor and Sam somehow manage to land their TARDIS inside an ancient time machine which has been infested with the remains of an ancient race of timelords. At least I think that's what it's about because I've read the last ten pages twice over and I'm still not sure. It all starts out spookily enough as we find a Doctor floating through a space being tortured by noises remembering the travellers initial trample through a void similar to the one which appears in the Big Finish cd Scherzo. Writer Andrew Miller captures the characters very well -- the Sam here seems a bit more realistic than I've heard her before.

As the opening chapter of a novel it'd be excellent -- but ooh only got a few pages to resolve the story, so instead The Doctor disappears into his own mind and has a chat with a future version of himself over a cup of tea about what's been happening. All tension disipates as drama gives way to exposition, with much talk of ancient Gallifrey and Rassilon and the like, followed by a 'with one leap they were free ending' which Reverend Lionel Fanthorpe would be proud of. The story ends with The Doctor and Sam realising they going to forget everything that happened ... I'm sorry what was I talking about?